Howdy to all you happy hosts and rental rock stars. Yes, even with the pandemic in effect you are all still rock stars!  Now, this is the part where I usually say to you "hope your April was full of booked nights and 5-star reviews" but right now just getting through it is good enough. I hope you are staying safe out there. In an attempt to provide hosts with information this month, we are going to look at the two big Airbnb controversies and try to understand what the CARES act says about mortgages. Not the most exciting topics, but I will try to keep it short and to the point.&nbs ..read more

Howdy to all you happy hosts and rental rock stars! I hope your March was full of booked nights and 5-star reviews. But let's be honest, it probably was not. We all are just trying to survive in the post COVID19 world. Like I said in our COVID letter, there is not one single solution for all hosts so each host needs to look at their unique situation and do what they can to get by. Rentals will come back at some point. Anyone that is saying the point is before June/July is not listening to the scientists. Personally I think it's going to be slow for most of the year as even when we are on the ..read more

Howdy to all you happy hosts and rental rock stars! I hope your February was full of booked nights and 5-star reviews. We are heading into that transition time when the winter weather listings start slowing down and the warm weather listing starts picking up. I have been toying with an idea for a while that I need to expand my listings so I have one in each type of area. That way it evens out my yearly cash flow. If anyone has something like this in place already, please reach out and let me know how it's working for you! But for now, let's look back on the February Host Wrap-Up!    _________ ..read more

Howdy to all you happy hosts and rental rock stars! I hope your January was full of booked nights and 5-star reviews. With the New Year underway, it's always a good time to do some host reflection. I like to look back periodically and see what guests have been the most profitable and least trouble. Then see if there is anything I can do attract that type of guest more often. Are there any changes I can make to my listing photos or write-ups that will make my listing more appealing to that type of person? Anyway, I think I am due for a look back soon, and maybe so are you? But before we do tha ..read more

Howdy to all you happy hosts and rental rock stars! I hope your December was full of booked nights and 5-star reviews. Holy news drop Batman! The last week of 2019 Airbnb dropped a ton of news on policy changes for hosts and guests.  It looks like they are trying to do everything they can to prevent any bad press from affecting their 2020 public stock offering. Given the volume and importance of the changes, we dedicated the first 2 sections of this newsletter to helping hosts understand the changes. I hope this helps you cut through the corporate-speak and understand what is actually happeni ..read more

Howdy to all you happy hosts and rental rock stars! I hope your November was full of booked nights and 5-star reviews. Ever notice how every year after Thanksgiving until Christmas, everyone kinda slows down a bit. Emails get answered a little slower. Phone messages start to pile up. Just getting people to complete tasks takes just a little longer than normal. It's almost like this time of year we remember to finally put friends and family first. Well, I completely got sucked into that. Sorry for the late newsletter and I hope everyone is having an amazing Holiday season. Now let's get on wit ..read more

Howdy to all you happy hosts and rental rock stars! I hope your October was full of booked nights and 5-star reviews. I know a lot of you struggle with local laws, but we as hosts need to involve ourselves in the process. If we don't show up, write letters, or simply ask to speak with our local officials one-on-one, then they will write the rules without our input.  A lot of local officials are not anti-Airbnb, they are just only hearing the bad stories. So I encourage you to try and speak with them in a quiet setting without the chaos of public hearings and just tell them your story. Let the ..read more

  Airbnb reviews are at the heart of what makes the site work. It is the way bad guests and hosts can be outed on the platform. For hosts, guest reviews affect your listing ranking, booking rate, and super host status. It is important for guests and hosts to rack up as many good reviews as possible. At the same time, don't get bent out of shape over a single bad review because even the best hosts get them. Given all this, it is important to understand how the review system works. Let's start with a quick list that will clear up some of the most common misconceptions: Hosts CANNOT read a guest ..read more

One of the single most important factors in getting your rental booked is where it ranks in the Airbnb algorithm. Like Google, Youtube or any other platform with a search engine, there is an ever-changing algorithm that determines what order things appear. Also,like all those platforms, we are never told what goes into the rankings on Airbnb. However, with enough trial and error, certain commonalities among the top-ranking Airbnb listings can be found. Although the ranking algorithm is always changing, we have found the following tips have constantly helped boost your ranking on Airbnb listin ..read more

  So you want to get an Airbnb Guest review removed? It is not easy, but it is possible if you understand their internal rules. Airbnb is very reluctant to ever remove a review unless it violates a specific part of its content policy. In their own words, the Airbnb policy on removing a review is as follows:    You can respond to reviews, but you can't delete them. To promote trust and transparency in our community, we won't delete reviews unless they violate our content policy.  What this means is when you are contacting Airbnb to get a review removed, you must cite a specific content policy ..read more